Marked By Lies: A Reverse Harem Series (The Marked Series Book 1) by Paige Orr (the red fox clan TXT) 📗

each file with a renewed sense of hope, and I’m so lost in what I’m doing that I don’t hear Eli until he clears his throat. I jump in my chair, swinging my wide eyes up to him, and give him a sheepish grin.

“What’s up Cail, did you find something on the disappearances?”

“Nothing concrete, but what if we’ve been booking in the wrong place this whole time?”

“What do you mean? There's not exactly been anything left behind that could give a clue about where to look.”

“That’s exactly what I mean we’ve been too narrow-sighted in our investigations. We keep thinking that this is one person acting alone, but what if it’s not?”

“You mean you think that it’s a group that’s doing this?”

“Not just a group, but a cult. We haven’t always killed all the members of these cults, so what if they’ve banded together and brought even more people in? Think about how many Fae are missing and tell me it’s not a possibility.”

I give him a moment as he seriously thinks over what I’m trying to say to him. I understand why he’s so hesitant to think that it could be true, but that’s exactly why I think it could be. This is just about the only thing that we haven't looked into, and we won’t know if it’s something we can discount until we look into its property.

“Alright, I can see why you think it could be important to look into. So what is it you need me to do?”

“For starters, can you get someone to bring any scrolls or books that we have confiscated from previous raids on the cults? Once they are here, I’m going to need help to read through them all. There’s bound to be quite a few to look through, and we can’t waste anymore time.”

“Okay, I’ll get someone on that right now. And Cail?”

“Yeah?”

“We will find whoever is responsible, and then we will make them pay for the hurt they have caused.”

With that, he turns on his heel, leaving the office to grab the closest person to collect what we need. I knew talking it through with Eli would help me look at everything from a fresh perspective, and I’m glad that I did. Things are much clearer now, and even though it won’t tell us where our people are, it will bring us one step closer.

When he comes back, he’s trailed by a line of our people with arms filled with boxes. They pile everything up at the side of my office, and to say the amount of shit we have to work through is daunting would be an understatement. I have the thought that it could all be worth it in my mind to help drive me though, so wasting no more time I collect the first box, placing it onto my desk.

Eli retakes his seat across from me and we both pull something out of the box, getting to work right away. In front of me, I have a book bound in what seems to be a skin of some sort, with symbols that are only ever present around the cults inscribed on the front. With any luck, we will find something useful in these.

We scour over book after book and scroll after scroll. Getting more frustrated as we go. After an hour, I sit back in my seat, scrubbing my hands down my face. At this rate, we’re going to be here for days and the thought of what could happen in that time makes anger burn through me.

I pull my phone across the desk, checking it for the fifth time and still having no messages from Zaphyr I decide to give him a call. I don’t know why I agreed to work with this unreliable bastard. I thought that he would have been able to put his grievances aside for the sake of his people, but instead, he’s gone off to do fuck knows what. When he finally answers the phone, I have to take a deep breath to stop myself from screaming at him in my frustration.

“Yes Cailean, Have you found something?”

“No, I fucking haven’t! I have a theory I’m working on, but more importantly, what the hell is happening on your side?”

“You always were so impatient. I’ve only just left my little detective’s office. She has agreed to help us as much as she can, she just needs you to send me the names and home addresses for those who have been taken from your side.”

“And why the fuck would she need that? We’ve already thoroughly investigated each of their homes and found nothing!”

“Yes, but having someone with a fresh set of eyes and less of a personal connection might turn up something new. Let her do her investigations, you never know, she might actually figure this shit out.”

“Fine! I’ll have Eli send you the information that she needs. I want to know who your friend is though, you might trust her, but I don’t know a damn thing about her!”

“I’ll send what I know through to you. I have to get going now, we have our own theories to work on. We will keep you up to date on what we find.”

Before I can even answer, he’s hung up and I groan before throwing my phone back onto the desk. That man is fucking infuriating! He better fucking hope that this woman can turn up something useful, otherwise I’m going to need to knock some sense into him.

It’s bad enough that we are working with an outsider on this, but letting her riffle through these homes is going to be difficult to explain to the worried families. I wish he had spoken to me before agreeing to anything with her, we’re supposed to be working as a team after all! Turning to Eli, I find him looking at